Charles Brackett

Charles William Brackett (November 26, 1892 – March 9, 1969) was an American screenwriter and film producer. He collaborated with Billy Wilder on sixteen films.

Life and career

Brackett was born in Saratoga Springs, New York, the son of Mary Emma Corliss and New York State Senator, lawyer, and banker Edgar Truman Brackett. The family's roots traced back to the arrival of Richard Brackett in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1629. His mother's uncle, George Henry Corliss, built the Centennial Engine that powered the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. A 1915 graduate of Williams College, he earned his law degree from Harvard University. He joined the Allied Expeditionary Force during World War I, and was awarded the French Medal of Honor.

He was a frequent contributor to the Saturday Evening Post, Collier's, and Vanity Fair, and a drama critic for The New Yorker. He wrote five novels: The Counsel of the Ungodly (1920), Week-End (1925), That Last Infirmity (1926), American Colony (1929), and Entirely Surrounded (1934).

Brackett was a president of the Screen Writers Guild (1938–1939) and for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (1949–1955). He either wrote and/or produced over forty films, including To Each His Own, Ninotchka, The Major and the Minor, The Mating Season (1951), Niagara, The King and I, Ten North Frederick, The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker and Blue Denim.

Beginning in August 1936, Brackett worked with Billy Wilder, writing the film classics The Lost Weekend and Sunset Boulevard, both of which won Academy Awards for their respective screenplays. Brackett described their collaboration process as follows: "The thing to do was suggest an idea, have it torn apart and despised. In a few days it would be apt to turn up, slightly changed, as Wilder's idea. Once I got adjusted to that way of working, our lives were simpler."

His partnership with Wilder ended in 1950 and Brackett went to work at 20th Century-Fox as a screenwriter and producer. His script for Titanic (1953) won him another Academy Award.

He received an Honorary Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in 1958.

Brackett died on March 9, 1969. His diaries covering his screenwriting and social life from 1932 to 1949 were edited by Anthony Slide into Slide's book It's the Pictures That Got Small: Charles Brackett on Billy Wilder and Hollywood's Golden Age.

Personal life Brackett married Elizabeth Barrows Fletcher in 1919. They had two daughters, Alexandra Corliss Brackett and Elizabeth Fletcher Brackett. His wife died in 1948, and in 1953, Brackett married Lillian Fletcher, her sister. They had no children.

Brackett was a Republican who voted for Alf Landon in 1936 and supported Barry Goldwater in the 1964 United States presidential election.

Works

Partial filmography

Tomorrow's Love (1925) – based on a story Interlocutory Risky Business (1926) – based on a story Pearls Before Cecily Pointed Heels (1929) – based on a story Secrets of a Secretary (1931) – based on a story College Scandal (1935) – writer Without Regret (1935) – writer The Last Outpost (1935) – writer Rose of the Rancho (1936) – writer Woman Trap (1936) – writer Piccadilly Jim (1936) – writer Live, Love and Learn (1937) – writer Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)* – writer What a Life (1939)* – writer Ninotchka (1939)* – writer Arise, My Love (1940)* – writer Hold Back the Dawn (1941)* – writer Ball of Fire (1941)* – writer The Major and the Minor (1942)* – writer Five Graves to Cairo (1943)* – writer, producer The Uninvited (1944) – producer The Lost Weekend (1945)* – producer, writer To Each His Own (1946) – writer, producer The Bishop's Wife (1947) – uncredited writer A Foreign Affair (1948)* – writer, producer The Emperor Waltz (1948)* – writer, producer Miss Tatlock's Millions (1948) – writer, producer Sunset Boulevard (1950)* – writer, producer Edge of Doom (1950) – writer (uncredited) The Mating Season (1951) – writer, producer The Model and the Marriage Broker (1951) – writer, producer Niagara (1953) – writer, producer Titanic (1953) – writer, producer Woman's World (1954) – producer Garden of Evil (1954) – producer The Virgin Queen (1955) – producer The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing (1955) – writer, producer Teenage Rebel (1956) – writer, producer The King and I (1956) – producer D-Day the Sixth of June (1956) – producer The Wayward Bus (1957) – producer The Gift of Love (1958) – producer Ten North Frederick (1958) – producer The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker (1959) – producer Blue Denim (1959) – producer Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959) – writer, producer High Time (1960) – producer State Fair (1962) – producer

("*" indicates collaboration with Wilder)

Awards and nominations Academy Awards YearCategoryFilmResultShared with 1939 Best Adapted Screenplay Ninotchka Billy Wilder & Walter Reisch 1941 Best Adapted Screenplay Hold Back the Dawn Billy Wilder 1945 Best Picture The Lost Weekend 1945 Best Adapted Screenplay The Lost Weekend Billy Wilder 1946 Best Story To Each His Own 1948 Best Adapted Screenplay A Foreign Affair Billy Wilder & Richard L. Breen 1950 Best Picture Sunset Boulevard 1950 Best Original Screenplay Sunset Boulevard Billy Wilder & D. M. Marshman Jr. 1953 Best Original Screenplay Titanic Richard L. Breen & Walter Reisch 1956 Best Picture The King and I 1957 Honorary Award